Eating in Persia

Where to eat? that was the question..Cunningham, Ashmawy and I took the trip by Metro from Sunnyland to Newcastle in order to taste the flavours of Lebanon. We reached the restaurant and walked in, the smell from the kitchen was heavenly, I don't know what spice it was, but it was tantalizing, the kind of smell I want to smell forever (okay...maybe not forever, but you get the point) The problem was the the Lebanese restaurant was booked out, it was a small place, and it was packed full! We were told we had to wait 45 mins in order to get a seat...we couldn't wait that long, we were absolutely famished. Ashmawy decided to speak to the Maitre'D in Arabic..we thought we might get special treatment by culturally aligning ourselves with him: That didn't work!
We didn't have the patience to wait 45 mins, so we decided to look elsewhere, we passed by a Spanish restaurant with absolutely no one inside. Passed an Italian, but the last time we three dined together it was Italian, moreover we had an apetite for the flavours of the Middle East.
The closest thing we saw was Greek! Not the Middle East, but still found in the Bible so it counts as 'one of them' We entered without properly looking at the food prices....we were shown our seats and were about to sit down before William (who had his characteristic worried look on his face) quipped 'Guys, we gotta go', but how? It would be slightly embarrasing to just up and leave when confronted with the menu! So we came up with a story, we said we had to go fetch more friends, so we'd be back in a bit. And off we went.
There it was, a diamond in the rough! 'Ali Baba' restaurant (forgive the rather childish name) serving the finest Persian dishes (Persian is Iranian for those that don't know). We went inside, the ambience was lush, I loved it, we loved it, we sat.
The waiter had bragged about the size of the dishes, challenging us as to whether we could finish it. The starters were huge, well at least William's and mine were (we ordered Koofteh..lamb meatballs) Ashmawy had stuffed Vine Leaves..and he wasn't stuffed (bad pun, but it had to be done)
My main course was a meal called 'Ghormeh Sabzi'...absolutely amazing! leek, parsley, spinach and coriander. This mixture is cooked with kidney beans, green onions, chives, dried limes, and lamb meat. It is then served with Basmati rice. I thoroughly enjoyed it!..I'll definately be going back
The price was right as well!


Ali Baba Restaurant
7-9 Bigg Market
Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 1UN